A Blog About Oil Painting

Some Work in Progress

Here's the start of a new painting. I worked out the design on paper before starting the block in and I used several photos from the photo shoot to piece it all together. I drew in the dogs gesturally with some raw umber and after that was dry I blocked in the rest and reinforced the dark areas using a mix of burnt umber and yellow ochre.

I started with the dogs. Partly because they are the center of interest of the painting and partly because they are the most interesting part to paint. It took just over a full day to get this part done.

This part of the background took longer to paint than the dogs. In fact I listened to Lady Chatterley's lover, Crime and Punishment, and lots of music on Spotify while I was painting it.

At this point I have all the canvas covered. I did the foreground a couple of different ways: in the original photographs it was all in shadow but when I painted it that way the picture lost the feel of being an integrated whole. I scraped that first try off and reworked it.

Henry and Buzi. 24x30 oil on linen. 2014.

After sitting on the painting for a while I went back and repainted some parts of the foreground around the dogs (I had already scraped it back when the paint was wet). I also repainted the tree and glazed and scumbled some areas of the house. Finally, I touched up some areas where the block in was showing through.

Footnote

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